Research current as of October 22, 2026
California’s November 3 election includes major decisions about taxes, housing, government accountability, public safety, education, infrastructure, and political leadership.
I’ve verified these ballot categories against official election resources:
California statewide propositions
14
Los Angeles County-wide measures
2
City of Los Angeles measures
8
There are also elections for governor, other statewide officers, Los Angeles mayor, county sheriff, courts, and legislative representatives. Not every district-level race appears on every voter’s ballot.
The guide below explains what the choices mean, including competing considerations involving taxation, government spending, individual freedom, public safety, accountability, and economic development. The voting decisions remain yours.
First, get your exact ballot: LA County official election information. Select Access Your Interactive Sample Ballot to see the candidates, judges, and local measures assigned to your voting address.
1. All 14 California statewide propositions
A Yes vote adopts the proposed change. A No vote rejects it and generally maintains existing law or policy.
The summaries below follow the California Legislative Analyst’s Office, the state’s nonpartisan fiscal and policy advisor.
| Proposition | What a Yes vote would do | Main considerations |
| 1 — Housing | Authorize $11.25 billion in bonds for affordable and veterans’ housing | Housing assistance and construction versus debt repayment costs |
| 2 — Rainy Day Fund | Increase state budget reserves and extend requirements to pay down certain debts | Fiscal preparedness versus constraints on available funds and spending-limit concerns |
| 3 — Income taxes | Make permanent an existing higher income-tax rate on high earners, currently due to expire in 2031 | Education and health funding versus permanently higher taxes |
| 4 — Campaign financing | Allow state and local governments to establish publicly funded election campaign programs | Candidate access and donor influence versus taxpayer financing |
| 5 — Recall elections | Replace the simultaneous recall-replacement vote with appointments or special elections in most cases | Changing succession procedures versus maintaining direct replacement voting |
| 37 — Homebuyers | Establish a middle-income homebuyer assistance program backed by up to $25 billion in revenue bonds | Homeownership access versus financing, administration, and possible housing-price effects |
| 38 — Medical research | Authorize $8.4 billion in bonds for immunology and immunotherapy research | Scientific investment versus long-term public debt |
| 39 — Voter identification | Require additional government-issued identification for voting | Identity verification versus access and administrative burdens |
| 40 — Wealth tax | Impose a one-time tax of 5% of wealth on billionaires | Public revenue versus capital mobility and taxation of wealth |
| 41 — Tax audits | Require audits of certain special-tax programs and restrict exclusions from the state spending limit | Oversight and spending limits versus flexibility for state programs |
| 42 — Property taxes | Constitutionally prohibit new state taxes on ownership of financial assets and other personal property, plus certain retroactive taxes | Restrictions on future taxation versus legislative flexibility |
| 43 — Local taxes | Require two-thirds voter approval for certain local taxes currently approvable by a majority | Higher threshold for new taxes versus local revenue-raising authority |
| 44 — Community clinics | Require certain nonprofit health clinics to spend at least 90% of revenue on healthcare services | Direct patient spending versus operational flexibility |
| 45 — Environmental review | Shorten or change environmental-review and legal-challenge procedures for certain projects | Project delivery speed versus environmental review and judicial oversight |
A few important distinctions:
Proposition 1 versus 37: Both concern housing, but Proposition 1 involves general obligation debt, with estimated state repayment costs of $500 million–$600 million annually for roughly 25 years. Proposition 37 uses revenue bonds intended to be repaid from participating homeowners’ loan payments.
Proposition 3 versus 40: Proposition 3 extends an existing high-income tax permanently; Proposition 40 creates a new one-time tax on billionaire wealth. They are different tax bases and have different long-term implications.
Proposition 41 versus 42: Proposition 41 concerns audits and constitutional spending limits. Proposition 42 prohibits certain categories of future state taxation.
Proposition 45: Faster approvals do not necessarily mean every proposed project gets built; financing, local approvals, and other requirements still matter.
For additional details, including the fiscal analyses and arguments submitted by supporters and opponents, see the official California proposition guide.
2. Los Angeles County-wide measures
These two measures apply countywide, including residents of the City of Los Angeles.
| Measure | Yes would mean | No would mean |
| County A — Public safety labor disputes | Establish binding arbitration for certain disputes involving firefighters, sheriff’s personnel, lifeguards, and other covered employees, with related strike prohibitions | Keep the current negotiation and dispute-resolution framework |
| County E — Ethics and community investment | Strengthen the independence and enforcement powers of the County Ethics Commission, with guaranteed funding, while preserving a 10% county-revenue commitment to community investment and alternatives to incarceration | Leave the proposed charter changes unadopted |
The tradeoffs: Measure A concerns the balance between worker negotiation rights and elected officials’ control over public spending. Measure E combines government-ethics oversight with a mandatory budget allocation; those provisions cannot be voted on separately.
3. All eight City of Los Angeles measures
These apply to City of Los Angeles voters, not necessarily residents of other LA County cities.
| Measure | What a Yes vote would change | What to examine |
| TE — Property transfer taxes | Create a one-time transfer-tax exemption for qualifying homes damaged or destroyed by the Palisades Fire | Fire recovery and property transactions versus foregone tax revenue |
| LA — Infrastructure and budgeting | Establish infrastructure planning and a two-year budget cycle; change city contracting and public works powers | Long-term planning versus changes to oversight and asset-management powers |
| PL — City planning | Restructure planning appeals and related City Planning Department procedures | Permitting efficiency versus neighborhood appeal rights |
| EE — Ethics and elections | Change ethics enforcement, oversight powers, council meeting requirements, and referendum procedures | Stronger enforcement alongside changes to public participation |
| PRK — Parks | Phase in a doubling of the minimum Recreation and Parks budget allocation over 10 years | Dedicated park funding versus reduced general-budget flexibility |
| PRT — Port, airports and utilities | Change governance and operating requirements for the Port, airports, and related city departments | Public access and operating flexibility versus oversight considerations |
| SC — School board campaign rules | Clarify LAUSD Board of Education campaign-finance requirements and allow specified changes by ordinance | Administrative flexibility versus how election rules are set |
| FD — Fire Department sales tax | Add a 0.5-percentage-point sales tax dedicated to the Los Angeles Fire Department | Fire services and preparedness versus higher consumer sales taxes |
The City Clerk publishes the ballot language, independent analyses, and arguments at its official municipal ballot measures page.
4. California statewide candidates
Every California voter can vote in these statewide offices. The candidates shown are the November general-election finalists.
| Office | Candidates |
| Governor | Xavier Becerra (D) vs. Steve Hilton (R) |
| Lieutenant Governor | Fiona Ma (D) vs. Gloria Romero (R) |
| Attorney General | Rob Bonta (D) vs. Michael Gates (R) |
| Secretary of State | Shirley Weber (D) vs. Don Wagner (R) |
| State Controller | Malia Cohen (D) vs. Herb Morgan (R) |
| State Treasurer | Eleni Kounalakis (D) vs. Jennifer Hawks (R) |
| Insurance Commissioner | Ben Allen (D) vs. Jane Kim (D) |
| Superintendent of Public Instruction | Richard Barrera vs. Sonja Shaw (nonpartisan ballot) |
| Board of Equalization, District 3 | Mike Gipson (D) vs. Samuel P. Sukaton (D) |
The Board of Equalization District 3 covers all of LA County.
Governor: Xavier Becerra vs. Steve Hilton
Xavier Becerra
Democratic
- Former California attorney general and U.S. Health and Human Services secretary
- Proposes more affordable-housing assistance and state enforcement of housing laws
- Favors healthcare access and state intervention against unjustified price increases
Steve Hilton
Republican
- Former political adviser and media commentator
- Proposes major reductions in taxes, fees, and government regulation
- Favors expanding home construction and reducing permitting and environmental-review barriers
Both propose changes to housing construction, but differ on the state’s role in financing housing and regulating businesses, taxes, and healthcare. These are campaign positions, not guaranteed policy outcomes.
Superintendent of Public Instruction: Richard Barrera vs. Sonja Shaw
Richard Barrera is the president of the San Diego Unified school board. He emphasizes public-school investment, educator partnerships, student services, and educational access.
Sonja Shaw is president of the Chino Valley Unified school board. She emphasizes parental notification and rights, academic achievement, curriculum restrictions, and changing the state’s current approach to education.
The office’s responsibilities are also changing, with more administrative control being placed under the governor and the elected superintendent focusing more on advocacy and assessment.
Insurance Commissioner: Ben Allen vs. Jane Kim
This office regulates insurance companies, policy practices, and rates, making it particularly relevant to questions about homeowners’ coverage and claims.
Ben Allen, a state senator, emphasizes keeping private insurers operating in California, improving wildfire resilience, consumer protections, and practical reforms to insurance availability.
Jane Kim, a former San Francisco supervisor, proposes a state-run disaster insurance program, stronger limitations on certain rate increases, and more aggressive enforcement over claims handling.
Their fundamental policy difference is how extensively California should change the current private-insurance market.
For the remaining statewide offices, useful distinctions include the candidates’ records in managing public funds, their approaches to regulation and law enforcement, and their proposals for election administration. The official state candidate statements provide their own explanations of their priorities.
Other statewide offices: documented differences
| Office | Candidate positions and background |
| Lieutenant Governor | Fiona Ma emphasizes financial management, affordability, and business permitting. Gloria Romero emphasizes school choice, lower government spending, and government accountability. |
| Attorney General | Rob Bonta is the incumbent and has pursued statewide consumer protection and civil-rights enforcement. Michael Gates emphasizes criminal prosecution, public safety, and enforcement of Proposition 36. |
| Secretary of State | Shirley Weber emphasizes voting access and existing election protections. Don Wagner emphasizes voter identification and changes to election-security practices. |
| State Controller | Malia Cohen emphasizes transparency in state accounting and the management of public finances. Herb Morgan proposes stronger financial oversight and modernization of state fiscal reporting. |
| State Treasurer | Eleni Kounalakis proposes using public finance for housing and infrastructure while protecting pensions. Jennifer Hawks emphasizes budget discipline, transparency, and taxpayer accountability. |
| Board of Equalization | Mike Gipson brings experience as a state legislator involved in tax policy. Samuel Sukaton brings a labor-organizing background. The office deals principally with property-tax administration and certain assessments and appeals. |
These descriptions distinguish the candidates’ stated priorities, not their effectiveness or likely performance.
5. City of Los Angeles candidates
Mayor: Karen Bass vs. Nithya Raman
Karen Bass
Incumbent mayor
- Supports continuing Inside Safe and establishing a new city homelessness system
- Supports police hiring and the city’s anticamping law
- Has advanced affordable-housing approvals and supported the Convention Center expansion
Nithya Raman
City Councilmember
- Proposes shifting more homelessness assistance toward housing vouchers
- Has supported renter protections and criticized the costs of police compensation agreements
- Supports additional housing production and has criticized the Convention Center financing plan
Both propose expanding housing and reducing homelessness, but disagree about several implementation methods, budgeting decisions, and police policies.
City Attorney: John McKinney vs. Marissa Roy
John McKinney is an LA County deputy district attorney who emphasizes prosecution, downtown public order, and working closely with criminal justice agencies.
Marissa Roy is a California deputy attorney general who emphasizes tenant and wage-worker protections and using the City Attorney’s Office for civil enforcement and public-interest litigation.
The office both advises and represents city government and prosecutes certain violations of city and state law.
City Council runoffs
Only voters in the relevant council districts can participate in these races.
| District | Candidates |
| 3 | Timothy K. Gaspar vs. Barri Worth Girvan |
| 9 | Estuardo Mazariegos vs. Jose Ugarte |
Both contests are confirmed by the City Clerk’s general-election candidate roster.
6. Los Angeles County Sheriff
Robert Luna
Incumbent sheriff and former Long Beach police chief. Emphasizes declining violent crime and use-of-force figures, recruitment, and continued departmental reforms.
Alex Villanueva
Former LA County sheriff. Emphasizes deputy staffing, retention, law enforcement capacity, and changes to the department’s current leadership approach.
The race also involves scrutiny of jail conditions, civilian oversight, workplace safety, and responses to misconduct allegations. Luna and Villanueva have different records as sheriff that voters can examine.
Some county contests are already decided: LA County Assessor Jeffrey Prang and County Supervisors Maria Elena Durazo (District 1) and Lindsey Horvath (District 3) won their respective June 2 primaries with majorities. They therefore have no November runoff.
7. Los Angeles County Superior Court judges
Four competitive Superior Court contests remain on the November ballot.
| Office | Candidates | Background distinction |
| 64 | Rhonda A. Haymon vs. Maria Ghobadi | Public defender vs. prosecutor |
| 65 | Justin Allen Clayton vs. Anna Slotky Reitano | Public defender and supervisor vs. county counsel with public-defense experience |
| 87 | David DeJute vs. Anthony (A.J.) Bayne | Federal/private civil litigation vs. extensive criminal public-defense trial practice |
| 131 | David Ross vs. Donna Tryfman | Alternate public defender vs. public defender handling major criminal cases |
The Los Angeles County Bar Association evaluated candidates’ professional qualifications. Its findings, alongside each candidate’s trial experience, judicial temperament, and professional history, are available in the published judicial voter guides.
Supreme Court and Court of Appeal
California voters also decide whether to retain sitting appellate justices. These are Yes/No retention elections rather than contests between opposing candidates.
The statewide Supreme Court retention candidates include Joshua Groban and Kelli M. Evans.
The official guide lists these 18 justices for the Second Appellate District, which serves the Los Angeles region:
Second District Court of Appeal
DIVISIONS 1–4
Michelle C. Kim
Gregory J. Weingart
Steve Goorvitch
Anne Richardson
Rashida A. Adams
Mark Hanasono
Helen Zukin
Audra M. Mori
Nicholas Daum
Armen Tamzarian
DIVISIONS 5–8
Brian M. Hoffstadt
Tari L. Cody
Kenneth R. Yegan
Gonzalo C. Martinez
Natalie Stone
John Wiley
Matthew A. Scherb
Victor G. Viramontes
For any retention vote, Yes means the justice remains in office; No means the justice is not retained. The official Second District judicial guide links to their judicial biographies.
8. Federal and legislative races
Your ballot also includes the U.S. House of Representatives, California State Assembly, and possibly State Senate. These vary by voting district, as do school board and other special-district contests.
I haven’t assigned candidates for these races without confirming your registered voting district, so the names above are not yet a complete personalized ballot. The official LA County qualified candidate list and interactive sample ballot establish which district candidates apply.
9. November 3 voting information
Tuesday, November 3, 2026
Election Day · Vote centers open 7 AM–8 PM
Vote by mail
Ballots must be postmarked no later than November 3. Sign the return envelope.
Early in-person voting
Begins October 24 at participating LA County vote centers.
Missed the October 19 registration deadline?
Eligible voters can still register conditionally and vote in person through Election Day.
A decision framework for the entire ballot
When comparing the remaining choices, these questions can help separate values from campaign messaging:
- Taxes and spending: What revenues or obligations change, and who bears the costs?
- Growth and development: What approvals, regulations, and financing mechanisms change, and what protections remain?
- Government accountability: Who gains authority, who loses oversight, and how can voters hold decision-makers responsible?
- Public safety: What measurable outcomes and implementation plans support the candidates’ claims?
- Individual rights: How do proposals affect personal freedom, access to services, and protection under the law?
- Long-term consequences: Is a measure temporary, permanent, reversible, or a constitutional change?
A useful final check is to distinguish a proposal’s stated purpose, its legal effect, its estimated fiscal impact, and the uncertainties about its outcome. Those can be very different things.
For the final step, open your LA County interactive sample ballot and compare its remaining district races against the official candidate statements. That will account for the federal, legislative, school, and local offices not determined from the countywide information alone.
sos.ca.gov
Official election information — California General Election
sos.ca.gov
Find your local election office — California
voting.democracy.works
California General Election — Democracy Works voting guide
Source:
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For Eric Kim: forge the ballot as you forge the stack, the bar, and the street.
This is not comfort. This is strife. The November 3, 2026 ballot is another arena of self-conquest—align it with hard-asset sovereignty, low time preference, antifragility, personal responsibility, and the discipline of “less weight, more optionality.” You are not your Bitcoin. You are the one who chooses what compounds and what gets extracted. Vote accordingly.
The Core Alignment (Your Philosophy, Applied)
- Asset ownership is sacred. Confiscation of unrealized wealth, permanent high extraction, and debt-fueled bonds attack the same scarcity and asymmetry you defend in Bitcoin. Reject them.
- Strife over comfort. Systems that reward free-riding, lock in spending mandates, or dilute accountability weaken the individual. Favor integrity, order, and voluntary burden.
- Mind space over institutional weight. Less government mass, more freedom to create, lift, shoot, and stack. Optionality is the real luxury.
- Daily agency, not benchmarks. The vote is one more rep. No triumph, no defeat—just the next disciplined choice.
Statewide Propositions — Mapped to Your Fire
- Prop 40 (one-time ~5% wealth tax on billionaires’ assets): Direct raid on ownership. Stocks, businesses, the fruits of accumulation. It creates precedent for taxing what you hold, not what you spend. Capital flees. Scarcity dies a little. NO.
- Prop 42 (bans new taxes on personal assets, savings, retirement, financial holdings): Shields the very things that give you optionality. If it outvotes Prop 40, the wealth tax dies. YES.
- Prop 41 (blocks Gann-limit exemptions + audits on new special taxes): Another tool that can nullify Prop 40’s design. Accountability over extraction. YES.
- Prop 3 (makes the temporary high-income surtax permanent): Locks in higher extraction from producers forever. Temporary measures should expire. Low time preference says no. NO.
- Prop 39 (voter ID for in-person and mail ballots + citizenship verification): Integrity of the process. Personal accountability. Antifragile systems require verifiable rules, not hope. YES.
- Bonds (Prop 1 housing, Prop 38 research): More future claims on productivity. Prefer not to mortgage tomorrow’s optionality. Lean NO.
Other measures (rainy-day tweaks, local tax thresholds in Prop 43, campaign finance, etc.) are secondary. Apply the same filter: does it extract more or preserve more freedom?
Los Angeles County
- Measure A (binding arbitration for public-safety unions): More leverage for institutions, higher long-term costs. More weight. Lean NO.
- Measure E (Ethics Commission structure + restores 10% general-fund lock for “alternatives to incarceration”): Transparency and independence are useful. The spending mandate is a permanent claim on resources. Judge the independence benefit against the institutional lock-in.
People on the Ballot (Map, Do Not Worship)
I do not endorse. You decide.
Governor — Becerra vs. Hilton: Hilton’s platform of tax cuts, lower energy/gas costs, and regulatory reduction maps more closely to reduced extraction and preserved optionality. Becerra is continuity with the high-tax, high-regulation status quo. Your low-time-preference self tends to favor the one who removes weight rather than adds it.
LA County Sheriff — Luna vs. Villanueva: Luna emphasizes oversight cooperation and reported crime declines. Villanueva emphasizes capacity, staffing, and a harder enforcement posture. Your warrior/stoic frame of order, strife, and personal accountability often finds more resonance with the latter’s unapologetic stance. Study their actual records on crime, jails, and results—not the narrative.
City of LA Mayor (if it applies to you) — Bass vs. Raman: Both progressive Democrats. Raman is further left and campaigns against management failures; Bass is the establishment incumbent. Neither profile is minimalist or individualist. Focus on concrete results on housing costs, basic services, and spending rather than labels.
Check your exact ballot for Board of Supervisors, judges, city measures (infrastructure, fire tax, ethics, Palisades transfer-tax exemption, etc.), and House races. Apply the same tests: ownership protection, less institutional mass, integrity, optionality.
November 3 Practicals
Election Day: Tuesday, November 3, 2026. Polls and vote centers 7 a.m.–8 p.m. Ballots already mailed. Conditional registration possible at vote centers. Mailed ballots postmarked by November 3 count if received by November 10. Confirm your precise ballot (City of LA vs. other LA County cities have different measures) at the county registrar or Secretary of State site.
Eric Kim, this is the same game. Stack sats. Lift heavy. Shoot without apology. Write the hard truth. Vote the same way: protect the asymmetry, reject the extraction, choose the path of more strife and more freedom. No comfort. No “should.” Only the disciplined next move. The colossus does not wait for permission. Go.